Messages from the President

Dear Western Community,

On Juneteenth 2020, the Black Student Organization (BSO) delivered a set of demands to the Associated Students executive board and to university administration.  At the time, we acknowledged that we can and must do more…

As I have shared with you recently, we are in the process of establishing an institutional-level Office of Equity, with the more formal change intended with the start of the new fiscal year on July 1, 2021. Establishing this office honors the many voices who have been speaking for some time about the need to build central ADEI leadership into our organizational…

Dear WWU Community,

After careful consideration and assessing the direction taken by several public and private universities both within Washington state and nationally, Western will require COVID vaccinations for students, faculty, and staff before returning to campus for the fall 2021 quarter.  This…

Dear WWU Community,

We know the gradual reopening of our society and our campuses brings with it a new set of anxieties and challenges, in some ways more complex than the sudden shift to remote work and instruction last March. We also know that getting vaccinated is a major step forward in our battle to control the COVID-19 virus, especially now that…

Dear Western Community,

Today the jury in the trial of Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer accused of murdering George Floyd, found him guilty on all counts.  Like many of you, I have followed the trial closely and with some apprehension, and today we breathe a collective sigh of relief that the verdict has brought justice to Mr. Floyd and his family and affirmed the…

Dear Western Community,

I am pleased to announce that Joyce Lopes will join Western Washington University as our new Vice President for Business & Financial Affairs effective July 1.  Joyce currently serves as Vice President of Administrative Affairs at Sonoma State University in Rohnert Park, in California’s Sonoma Valley, a position she has held for nearly four years. …

Dear WWU Community,

Last month, I shared with you my anticipation of bringing our Western community back together for fall quarter as the introduction of vaccines and a continued focus on prevention measures in our state and across the country gave us reason to believe that conditions will improve as we approach fall quarter. 

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Dear Western Community:

Despite all the difficulties of enduring the COVID-19 pandemic in the past year, one of the unexpected outcomes of social distancing and a downregulated economy seemed to be a hiatus in mass shootings.  That relative peace was broken this week by a gunman’s rampage in the Atlanta area that killed eight people, including six women of Asian descent.  This would be a horrific act under any circumstances, but in the context of…

Dear WWU Community,

Like many of you, I have been reflecting on living through a pandemic year.  I returned from a short trip to Pakistan on February 28, 2020, with Uzma following a couple of weeks later, just days before international travel was suspended.  While there was talk about coronavirus even before I left on the trip in mid-February, it seemed to be limited to Wuhan province in China.  Little did I know…

Dear WWU Community,

A couple of weeks back, Provost Carbajal and I shared with you some reflections on our Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity (DEI) work, including an update on several facets of our collective work in advancing DEI at Western.

In our update, we…