Video Transcript
[Dr. Jeremiah Shinn]: Is it possible that a single conversation could change everything? Could just a little extra effort make all the difference? Could a small act of kindness change the course of someone’s life?
Over the next 36 hours, thousands of students from every corner of our state and from across the American west and beyond, will unload tubs at the curb, lug dorm fridges up the staircases and take their first steps into adulthood, right outside this building. I imagine at this very moment, there’s a young woman from a rural town, maybe Salmon, maybe Mud Lake, packing up her dad’s truck for the trip to Boise tomorrow. Maybe she’s the first in her family to go to college.
Maybe she’s the only one in her friend group, who’s choosing this path. But somebody, a guidance counselor, a teacher, a coach, somebody saw something in her, encouraged her to apply and now she’s a Bronco. She might be grappling with what it means to leave behind her little brother, or her boyfriend who just took a job on a local farm. She might be excited, she might be terrified, she might be both. From the moment she moves in tomorrow, it is far too likely that she doesn’t come back to campus after Thanksgiving, not because she isn’t smart enough, she is, not because she isn’t prepared to be here, she is and not because she isn’t resilient, she absolutely is. It’s because leaving home is hard. Doing something nobody in your family has ever done is hard. The only question is will she find a community here? Will she meet people who care? Will she get the support she needs? Because if she doesn’t, she might decide this place just isn’t for her and she’ll be fine. She’ll go back to her community and share her brilliance with people, who already know and love her.
But what if? What if she’s the teacher, who would help hundreds of high-school students, see the potential in themselves that nobody else could see? What if she’s the nurse, that one smiling face, who can calm the nerves of scared kids when they visit the doctor’s office? What if she sees something in biotechnology that nobody else has ever seen? What if her emotional intelligence and moral clarity put her in a position to broker a piece that has eluded generations? What if her brain is the one with the key for curing Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s? Her presence here matters to her, to us, maybe even to the world and we are the ones who get to welcome her. We get to serve her. We get to offer the kind word, the helpful hand, the little moment of encouragement that could change everything.
Friends, this is the work and I couldn’t be prouder to do this work with you. At the center of our culture is an unrelenting commitment to student success both inside and outside the classroom. That student, the one from Mud Lake, she stays because somebody in this room will smile at her on campus tomorrow. Because somebody will remember her name, because somebody will take five minutes on Monday to walk her to the SMASH Building, so she doesn’t end up on the other side of campus, late for class and too embarrassed to go in. Our commitment to students isn’t a slogan. It’s not buried on the last page of our strategic plan. It’s not just words on our website. It’s who we are and it’s what we do and it’s working. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (crowd cheering) (upbeat music) (audience applauding)
During a national moment where so many universities are working tirelessly, just to main altitude as we hit the so-called enrollment cliff, we are climbing. This fall, we’re expecting at least 500 more first-year Broncos than we welcomed last fall. And that’s on top of a 10% increase of first-year students last year. Our retention and graduation rates continue trending upward. And we are fulfilling our promise as a public university building a life-changing experience that’s more affordable, easier to navigate and more student-centered than ever before. Students from rural Idaho are coming here and staying here. Veterans and transfer students are charting new paths here. First-generation students are showing us what it looks like to change the course of their family’s future. And thousands of them are not only attending classes on our campus, but they’re also living with us too. This is important. Because students who live on campus are more likely to come back for their second year than if they lived off-campus. They’re more likely to graduate in six years and they’re far more likely to graduate in four years than students who live off-campus. This is because they’re closer to you. They’re closer to campus resources. They’re closer to that impromptu chemistry tutoring session. They’re living among peers and building a community that will be there for them their entire college career.
Syringa Hall is our newest residence hall. And since we didn’t have a chance to give everybody a tour before it opened, I’d like to take you on a tour right now. (audience laughing) (bright music)
Hello and welcome to Syringa Hall. This is the newest addition to our campus community. We’re proud to continue investing in our student success and Syringa Hall is a great example of that commitment. Syringa Hall is designed to support first-year students as they transition into college. It’s modern, it’s welcoming and it’s built with the student experience at the forefront. This 98,000 square-foot residence hall houses up to 452 students and is one of our newest communities, focused on connection, learning and wellness. Students who live on campus their first year are more likely to succeed academically and feel a stronger sense of belonging. This is what we hope for for every Bronco. This building features community spaces, shared lounges and study areas to encourage interaction, collaboration and friendship that last well beyond the first year. Syringa puts our students in the center of campus life with quick access to classrooms, the library, Student Union and the Boise River Greenbelt. Syringa Hall is more than just a building. It’s a continued symbol of Boise State’s investment in student success and community. To all our incoming Broncos, we can’t wait to welcome you here. And to our entire community, thank you for continuing to support spaces where students can learn, grow and thrive. (upbeat music) (audience applauding)
The Boise State University experience exists in many forms, on-campus, off-campus and virtually. More than 6,000 Boise State students are enrolled in fully online programs. The majority of our fully online students are adult learners, whose life circumstances might not allow them to come to campus as often as they would like. They typically have jobs, they’re raising families, caring for aging parents, or they might just not live close enough to commute. Despite these hurdles, fully online students boast a 76% six-year graduation rate. And the demand continues to grow. Our online enrollment is up nearly 7% over last year and 12% over two years ago. We are serving Idaho’s adult learners with nearly 2,400 Idahoans enrolled in fully online programs. Nearly 30% of these students are from rural communities. And we’re also proud that online students from around the country want to be Boise State Broncos. In all 30% of the degrees and certificates that we awarded last year, were earned by fully online students. Now, most of these programs were developed during the past decade as part of a comprehensive online initiative responding to the workforce needs of our state without requiring new funds from our state. And it’s not just fully online students that are benefiting from these programs. Last year, more than 20,000 students took at least one online course, just to add a little bit of flexibility and variety to their schedule. In all, online courses accounted for 38% of our credit hour generation last year. We are so proud of the way we serve online students and residential students and veteran students and students from rural communities, all of this. Every data point, every personal story flows from a shared belief in the transformational power of a Boise State University education.
Now, I don’t wanna bury the lede. The state of our university is strong and growing stronger with each passing semester. We want our students to find a community here. We want them to be successful here. But more than anything, we want them to become who they’re trying to become, to become scholars, to become leaders, to become what they didn’t know was possible when they first applied to Boise State. And as they’re becoming, so are we, so is our university. In so many ways, we are still becoming what we’re going to become and I think that’s an exciting place to be. We all, all of us, get to put our handprints in the cement here. Friends, this is what our blueprint for success is about. It’s not about bureaucracy. It’s about intentionally becoming what we’re trying to become, so that students can grow into their potential and shape the future of Idaho. All of us, together are making it easier for students to come here, to stay here and to be successful here. We are wired for creativity, motivated by discovery and committed to positioning our state as a formidable competitor on the national and the global stage. We are on the precipice of navigating the steep trajectory from earning university status just 51 years ago to becoming an elite research university on our terms. We’re committed to strengthening our role as a trusted partner in serving and advancing Idaho communities. And as we do this work, we’re mindful that our organization is made up of people, really good, creative, hardworking people.
Whether you’re teaching a course, or keeping our campus safe or financially sound, you are making this place go. Whether you’re advising ASBSU, beautifying the quad, or doing pre-award work for federal grants, you play a vital role in helping us do what we do for our students and for our state. Even during this transition period, we’re not pumping the brakes on our strategic priorities. We’re accelerating and we’re doing it with intention and we’re doing it with focus.
Take the School for the Digital Future. It’s not just offering degrees, it’s giving our students an opportunity to build personalized, flexible, career-driven pathways that will prepare them for jobs that don’t exist yet and for a future that we can’t even imagine yet, or the School of Computing launched less than a year ago, it already houses our fastest-growing PhD program where students are exploring AI, cybersecurity and data science fields that will surely shape the next decade in Idaho and around the globe. That work includes our continuing commitment to support our semiconductor industry, a sector that’s exploding worldwide and growing exponentially right here in our backyard. We are building pipelines from K-12 all the way to PhD programs, helping students from every background see a future for themselves in science, technology, engineering and math. We’re working alongside industry partners and with communities across our state to ensure that our students aren’t just employable, but they are also becoming the first and best choice for Idaho jobs. We’re not just responding to today’s workforce, we’re helping to shape it. And as our students are doing the work to become the first and best choice for Idaho jobs, not everything they learn will happen inside a classroom or a lab. Sometimes, it happens under the stars.
Meet Brian Jackson, a physics professor, who turns the Boise State University quad into a telescope garden the first Friday of each month. He and his students are helping school children, lawmakers and community members see distant galaxies. They’re collaborating with music students to score the discovery of new planets. And in his free time, he’s measuring wind on Mars, mentoring our student researchers as they monitor the universe In search of exoplanets. Dr. Jackson is harnessing curiosity and fueling discovery often right here in our own quad. So, I wonder, (audience applauding) I wonder if that student we imagined earlier, the one from Salmon, might she get to meet Dr. Jackson? Will she collaborate with her peers to score the narrative for discovering a new planet? Will she discover something about Mars that nobody else has ever seen? Our work matters, because we’re making it possible for her, for every student to become what they’re trying to become. That’s Dr. Jackson’s role, that’s my role, that’s your role. We don’t always know who or what will resonate. We just know that it’s happening all the time, every day, all around us. That’s why we’re bold, that’s why we’re flexible and that’s why we’re kind. That’s why we don’t operate with a checklist. But instead, we create an environment where students become who they’re meant to become. This is why we do this work.
Because we believe that students like her, like the one from Salmon or Mud Lake, are capable of doing heroic things, compassionate things, everyday things that matter. We believe that Boise State University will propel students forward and in doing so, will propel Idaho forward. During the past decade alone, we’ve taken major steps to becoming the kind of research university that our state needs us to be. We are knocking on the door of Carnegie Research 1 status and we’re doing it our way with a focus on undergraduate education, with a focus on serving our communities and with a focus on delivering what this state needs from us. As you can see, our rise has been nothing short of staggering. Our sponsored project expenditures, remain steady this past year, despite adapting to a changing federal funding landscape. This underscores the resilience and continued impact of our research and creative activities. Now, to be competitive in securing external funding, you have to grow your capacity to ask for it and we’ve done that as well. Our proposal volume has grown by $110 million in eight years. Now, you’ll notice that proposal submissions were down slightly in FY25. But we have no reason to believe that that’s anything other than an outlier year. As part of the NSF’s Accelerating Research Translation program, we’re expanding support for translational research across the university, which is good for our state, good for our region and beyond. Looking ahead to fiscal year ’26, it’s already showing momentum toward our goal of Research 1 status. Several large-scale proposals, collectively exceeding $20 million have been recommended for funding and the university is advancing initiatives to expand its portfolio and partnership with industry, foundation and other sponsors. These investments will broaden Boise State’s research and creative activity footprint and provide students with even more hands-on opportunities for learning.
A great example of our Idaho-focused research, is our interdisciplinary BlueWater Initiative that brought together researchers and external stakeholders to plan for Idaho’s most critical natural resource, water. We are advancing water research with more than $25 million in external funding during the past decade alone. 47 of our faculty members work on water issues, representing 15 different disciplines from mountains to molecules and from policy to people. This fall, a new vertically integrated project will bring students into the mix to address water issues in our mountains. Boise State is serving Idaho by becoming a leader, by ensuring that water, the cornerstone of our state and our economy, continues to be so for generations to come on. Another uniquely Idaho challenge is being tackled with ingenuity, science and a little grit in the Sawtooth Mountains near Stanley, a place where we’re making progress, again, not just in labs, but under the big Idaho sky. Cheap grass is infamous for choking out native species, creating nightmares for wildlife and land managers alike. And it makes our Western Rangelands far more susceptible to wildfires. Boise State researchers are working diligently to solve this critical problem for Idaho. This and all of it, our research is rooted in belief, belief that a public university should benefit the public, belief that constraints are often the catalysts for creativity and the belief that we can be both, a rising research powerhouse and a student-centered university in service to our state. Because we know our research matters, it matters to the residents of Salmon and Mud Lake, it matters in all corners of Idaho. And as we do this world-class research, as we build world-class research labs and secure critical grant dollars, we don’t do it with rankings or recognition in mind. We do it because we embrace our responsibility to serve by advancing knowledge and improving our communities, just like we do in many fields, construction management, nursing, education, the arts, business. The experiences our students have here, prepare them to do remarkable things.
Tempe Regan earned a master’s degree in our unique Raptor Biology program in 2016. She works as a biologist for Idaho Fish and Game in Salmon, Idaho. She’s also an artist. And I’d like for you to meet Tempe. (bright music)
[Tempe Reagan]It all started with a pond. When I was a kid, I used to come home from school and run out to the ponds and catch frogs and basically I called myself a frog farmer. And that was where my love of nature was born. And so, pretty much from the very beginning, I always knew what I wanted to do, which was to be a wildlife biologist. And post undergrad, I worked a few years in the field before attending graduate school at Boise State University where I got my master’s in Raptor Biology. And from there, I spent a few years in Boise, working for the Intermountain Bird Observatory before taking this job with Idaho Department of Fish and Game in Salmon, Idaho. So, what I’ve been doing today is a wetland survey. And when we do those surveys, we’re looking for qualities of wetland condition, wetland health, things that are gonna make it persist, water quality, what kind of human impacts are at the site. So, are there ATVs running through the water? Is there damming, diversions, sediment runoff? And then finally and maybe the most exciting part is when we do the survey, we’re looking to quantify all amphibians and reptiles that we see during the survey, so, everything from eggs to adults to juveniles of any amphibian species. (birds chirping) (water dripping) The mission of Idaho Fish and Game is to preserve, protect, perpetuate and manage all wildlife for the people of Idaho. Obviously, we do a lot with big game and the animals that are hunted and fished, but there’s also a sub-sector of the department that’s working on the non-game species. And that’s what I’m really, really passionate about and that is what inspires my art. And so, those are really the species I seek to showcase in my art, the ones that people don’t really know exist, unless they’re deep into science, or spend a lot of time outside. And so, those are the ones I wanna bring out of the woods and into the spotlight for the citizens of Idaho. (light acoustic music) So, I always drew as a kid. But other than a high-school art class, I don’t have any formal artistic training. I’m kind of self-taught and really didn’t pursue art professionally, until I was a graduate student at Boise State. It kind of provided me inspiration through the subjects I was seeing in nature. Actually one day, I found a dead flicker, northern flicker on the ground and all the feathers were so beautiful. I was like, “Wow, we always focus on the whole bird and never the individual feathers.” My signature piece as Tempe Regan nature artist are these feather studies where I focus on the feathers and the bird is kind of grayed out in graphite behind the feathers. Observing is important to science and observing is important to art. And building connections between the two is kind of where I find myself on my artistic journey. (bright upbeat music) I hope through my art, I can bring connection to nature and really instill value in creatures and wildlife and places that people don’t see every day. Like people don’t see a long-toed salamander, or a sora every day. They might not even know that bird exists. But if I can bring it to life in highly accurate detail on a piece of paper, maybe, there’s some person in a hospital somewhere that might see that picture and it might light them up and bring them joy for the day. And so, my goal is to connect people to nature through my art. (bright upbeat music) (audience applauding)
[Jeremiah Shinn] Now, I don’t mean to alarm you, but we’re in a time of transition. Our university is changing, the political, economic and cultural realities around us are changing. But despite that change or perhaps because of it, our commitment to our mission, to our shared purpose remains constant. It’s our foundation. We know you have questions and thoughts about how all these changes will affect your programs and the university. And we’re planning a fall road show to visit with every college, bringing members of the executive team to hear directly from you. So, definitely watch your inbox for an invite. In the meantime, I assure you, Boise State University is not standing still amid the changes.
We’re in the midst of unprecedented philanthropic support. As of August 13th, our Unbridled campaign had raised more than $465 million in support for students, faculty and athletics. (audience applauding) That’s more than 93% of the way toward our original $500-million campaign goal and we are way ahead of schedule. One of the secrets to our future success will be our investment in our faculty. More than $72 million has been raised for faculty support, including 20 new endowed faculty roles. More than $115 million has been raised for student support. We are striving to ensure that a quality education remains in reach for all students no matter their circumstances. More than $192 million has been raised in support of our athletics program so far. This additional support has meant updates on things like locker rooms for women’s track, cross-country, golf and beach volleyball and the installation of lights on the softball and soccer fields. This campaign, this is what belief looks like in action. People view Boise State University as a sound investment. They’re investing in our faculty, they’re investing in our students, they’re investing in our athletics program. Everyone here today, everyone plays a role in ensuring that Boise State University is and continues to be a sound investment. Now, despite nearing our original goal of $500 million, we’re not winding down, we’re sprinting beyond the finish line. One area where we still have significant need is support for need-based scholarships for Idaho students. We simply don’t have enough. Finances are still a barrier for far too many of our students. I’ve set the goal of raising $150 million in support for Idaho need-based scholarships. Now, that sounds like a lot more than we could ever need, but it isn’t. That $150 million endowment translates to a $2,000 scholarship for 3000 of our students each year. That’s still not every student with need and it still doesn’t cover their full need. But that $2,000 can be a game-changer for them and for us. And I wanna be clear, while we still have three major priorities, at this point in the Unbridled campaign, this is our greatest need. And I have no doubt that Bronco Nation will rise to the occasion in support of our talented and deserving students.
In addition to strengthening our ability to support our students, our faculty and student athletes, we are committed to strengthening the ties that bind our community. Our Institute for Advancing American Values, is building a roadmap for the kind of conversation I believe is possible in our communities by modeling civility, building empathy and celebrating our shared humanity. This important programming is for multiple audiences, but I would like to share one in particular today, Idaho Listens. I had an opportunity to attend one of the six Idaho Listens’ sessions that have been held around our state. And for those of you that haven’t attended, or are unfamiliar with Idaho Listens, the program is very simple. A group of community members from all walks of life and from across the political spectrum, assemble their friends and their family along with community members for an evening. During the evening, each of these people speaks individually about what they value and why. There is no debate, there are no questions, there is no response from the audience, only listening. After each of the speakers has had an opportunity to share what they value and why, everyone has a meal together to discuss what they’ve heard and to explore the common ground that exists in their community. For me, it was such a powerful reminder of how much we can discover that we have in common when we take the time to listen without debating, without questioning, without forming a response. Idaho Listens has been so well-received across our state that it’s moving beyond the borders of the Gem State. Michigan Listens will debut in November and I’m looking forward to being there to witness how a simple but profound idea hatched right here on our campus will ripple across the country. In a world that sometimes feels fractured, Boise State is committed to helping people reconnect around shared values and mutual respect.
Another facet of American life that has changed dramatically over the past few years is intercollegiate athletics. Unprecedented changes in our environment are shaping the way we think about the role that athletics plays in a university and in a community. We remain proudly committed to our athletics program. And I believe one of the reasons for our university’s success has been our historic embrace of athletics in all corners of campus. We are uniquely positioned to emerge as a national model for navigating and shaping the future of intercollegiate athletics. And our commitment to being part of that conversation is built on the excellence that our student athletes have achieved on the field and in the classroom. It’s important for everyone here to understand that we operate a nationally relevant athletic program on a fraction, a fraction of the resources available to most of our competitors. Even so, I want you to look at this list. This is where we rank nationally in graduation success rate and the company that we’re keeping. We had the best rate in our conferences’ history this past year. And again, we’re graduating our student athletes at a rate only exceeded by a few other universities in the entire country. This is a big deal. Our student athletes are not only graduating, they’re excelling in the classroom. During the past year alone, our athletic department achieved the highest cumulative GPA in our history. And by the way, our student athletes are also pretty good athletes. Last year, they won 16 individual and team championships. A Boise State University student was the runner-up for the Heisman Trophy and a top 10 draft pick in the NFL. (audience applauding) Across all of our sports, we led the conference in total attendance for the second consecutive year. Our football team was one of 12 teams in the entire country that qualified for the college football playoff, a Fiesta Bowl matchup that showcased Boise State University to 14 million TV viewers. USA Today named our Blue Turf as the best attraction for sports fans for the second consecutive year. USA Today on every hotel-room door stop. (audience laughing) And by the way, I don’t know if you heard, we officially accepted an invitation to join the Pac-12 conference starting in July, 2026. (audience applauding)
We’re also winning on the cutting-edge of intercollegiate athletics. Our Esports program is the most successful, NCAA Division I collegiate Esports program in the entire country. We are what others strive to be. We’ve earned 13 Mountain West Championships and six national championships, since our conference officially sanctioned Esports. As I mentioned, the intercollegiate athletics landscape continues to change rapidly.
Name, image and likeness isn’t a conversation we expected to be having way back when we hoisted that first Fiesta Bowl trophy. But I’m immensely proud of how we’re leading the way amid all of these changes. Rather than hoping that it will go back to the way it was, it’s not going back to the way that it was, we’ve embraced the change by launching a turnkey NIL and revenue-sharing entity, established for the benefit of our student athletes. It drives competitive excellence through a best-in-class revenue-sharing program focused on recruiting and retaining student athletes, while also helping them navigate this new reality in a healthy and productive way. And like with all things, we’re putting our students first. Athletics is working with Dr. Sam Ehrlich and other faculty members in the College of Business and Economics to help ensure that our students have the financial knowledge that they need to navigate this new reality. We’re so proud of our student athletes, we’re proud of our sports programs, we’re proud of our storied history. And just as our academic growth has benefited from our athletic success, our athletic success benefits from our academic growth.
Just like athletics is part of our foundation, so is our community’s relationship, our special relationship with the Basque Country. Last year, I joined a group of my colleagues and the Basque president in Oñati to celebrate 50 years of partnership between that community and Boise State University. It was the kickoff to an amazing celebration that culminated just a few weeks ago when we hosted the Basque president and members of his cabinet along with the president of the University of the Basque Country and members of his faculty on our campus. Please watch. (bright upbeat music)
[Jeremiah Shinn] The Basque culture is woven into the fabric of Boise. It’s woven into the fabric of Boise State University and I think it’s important that we commemorate that and we celebrate that with a week of activities around new partnerships, families, culture and what’s possible between Boise State University, the Basque Country and the University of the Basque Country in the future. (bright upbeat music)
[Gotzone Barandika Argoitia] For us, the alliance with Boise State University is a very important step forward in this internationalization of our universities and this multi-campus understanding of ourselves. And we would like to call this a transoceanic campus. So, we are very glad of this new venture and we hope to take it to very excellent results. And we’re very pleased to have this agreement memorandum of understanding with Boise State University. (bright music) (audience applauding)
[Estitxu Garai] In these times of uncertainty in which people feel sometimes afraid of what’s going to happen, having the sense of belonging to a bigger community, makes us feel much better. So, it’s a way of preparing a better future for our kids and for another generations and being a part of something bigger.
[Argia Beristain] Boise State started a relationship with the Basque Country 50 years ago and has done so many different activities since then. It’s just incredible for me to take a moment to stop to celebrate all that we have done already and to create new agreements with the University of the Basque Country and to welcome the Basque government here with the eye towards what will the future bring. Because we feel that the stronger that we can build the bridges between Boise State and the Basque Country, the better both of our communities will be. (audience cheering) (audience applauding)
[Jeremiah Shinn] I’m just so thankful to the Basque government and the leadership of the University of the Basque Country for being in this space with us, for celebrating with us and for dreaming with us about what’s possible.
[Estitxu Garai] I would like to thank to Boise community, Idaho community and specifically the Boise State University for their big generosity and a great friendship. (bright music) (audience applauding)
There are so many reasons that even in the midst of transition, we can rely on the strong foundation we’ve built as a campus community. In the coming weeks, candidates for this role will be visiting campus. I’m confident in the diligence of the search process and I can tell you, people want to join this team. And I believe that the strength of this team combined with great leadership will continue to propel us forward. Because at the end of the day, our strength is built on something more lasting than whomever is in this role, or what’s in the news on any given day. We believe in education, we believe in opportunity, we believe in prosperity for our students and our state. And because of that belief, we’re committed. Not slogans, action, not words, impact, not waiting, building.
So, is it possible that a simple conversation could change everything that you showing up and doing what you do can make a difference for our students, for our state? Absolutely. Because it happens every day, whether we know it or not. It could change everything when a faculty member lingers after class and says to that struggling student, “You’ve got this,” when a staff member, that campus rec remembers a student’s name and when you walk that first-year student who’s lost to the right building and tell them without saying a word, “This is your home.” That student from Salmon, she doesn’t need something bright and shiny. She’s not asking for the whole university to rally around her. She just needs one person. And every single one of us in this room can be that one person. That’s the power of this place. Not just in what we teach or what we build, but how we show up for one another and how we live out our educational mission, our purpose, every single day. And in doing so, we open the door for possibility for them, for Idaho and for each of us. You are the reason that our students stay here and you are the reason that they succeed when they leave here. And you are the reason, this university has become the rocket ship that it is. I want you to know, I’m so proud to be part of this work with you.
The first time I ever set foot on this campus on October 13th, 2009 during my interview visit, I knew I wanted to be a part of this. It was a very, very different place back then. But even then, I had a sense of its possibility and its purpose. I had a sense of the opportunities here and I fell in love with it. And my belief in Boise State never wavered, even as I worked on another campus for four years. This university has changed me for the better. And I’ve seen it change students, colleagues, alumni and friends for the better too. We don’t do this work because it’s easy, we do this work because it matters. So, as we begin this new academic year, let’s stay firmly rooted in our purpose. Let’s be open to what’s possible. Let’s keep our foot on the gas and let’s keep building the kind of university that prepares students to do hard things, to do bold things, to do important things, extraordinary things. It’s the honor of my life to serve you in this role and I’m so grateful to be on your team. Thank you and go Broncos. (audience applauding)Â