Dear Friends:

It is a privilege for me to write you today as St. Andrews’ new president. I’m keenly aware of the responsibility that comes with the job, and particularly mindful of the trust and confidence that has been placed in me as the first graduate of St. Andrews, Flora Macdonald or Presbyterian Junior College to serve in this office.

I’m grateful for the hundreds of emails, letters and phone calls of support that I received from alumni and friends from around the country. With your strong vote of confidence in me personally, coupled with a talented administrative team and an extraordinary faculty and staff, I know that together we can continue to fulfill our mission as a distinctive and necessary voice in American higher education.

Since the time of my appointment, I have been meeting one-on-one and in small groups with faculty, staff and students to get a better sense of what it is that we, as a community, believe about St. Andrews. I’m asking our stakeholders here on campus what they think is distinctive about the college, what it is that we do well, and in what ways are we falling short. This dialogue has been both revealing and affirming. I’m hearing a genuine confirmation of what we often say about our education—it’s interdisciplinary, global, values-centered, broad-based, open-minded, unconventional, experiential, nurturing, outside-the-box and transformative. I’m also hearing new, yet compatible, hopes and aspirations for our future.

Over the course of the next six to nine months, I plan to take faculty and staff on the road with me whenever possible to engage as many of you as we can in this same dialogue. When you receive an invitation to join us on a visit to your community, I hope you’ll mark your calendar and make a point of being with us. As we move forward in an increasingly competitive higher education market, we are going to need your very best ideas on how we can be true to our history and beliefs as a college, while at the same time be bold, and maybe even a bit daring, in charting our path over the course of the next ten to twenty years. It’s going to be an exhilarating ride, and I’m glad that as alumni, friends, faculty, staff and students, we’re in this together! I look forward to talking with you soon.

Paul Baldasare ’77
President

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