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President’s column: Finding inspiration in our graduates

If there is a theme running through the three alumni profiles in this issue, it is the potential for using your Laurier experience as a springboard for combining personal passions with a rewarding career.

All three graduates — Bill Webb (BBA, ’86), Alison Wearing (BA ’89), and Jeff Melanson (MBA ’99) — have lived truly unique and impressive lives.

Webb combined his business education with an interest in travel and foreign cultures to build an extraordinary career in finance and investment. Wearing, another intrepid traveler, used her arts degree as a foundation for writing best-selling books and creating award-winning performance art. And Melanson, a trained opera singer, enhanced his passion for music with a Laurier MBA and has gone on to become one of Canada’s most skilled and visionary arts administrators.

All three are a testament to hard work, imagination and an innovative approach to making the most of your university experience.

It is important to celebrate such inspired individuals. They show us the true worth of higher education — how to see connections and possibilities, how to think both critically and outside the box, and how to engage with the wider world in a way that is both personal and deeply rewarding.

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Laurier President and Vice-Chancellor Max Blouw (left) with Daughters for Life Laurier student co-president Elliot Alder (right). 

While study after study confirms the financial rewards of a university degree, stories such as those that you will find in every issue of this magazine tell us about non-financial benefits. The hallmark of a Laurier education is the well-rounded, academically rich yet community-centered experience that we provide to students. In recent years we have come to think of it as “integrated and engaged learning,” a phrase that reflects the more intentional and purposeful approach that we bring to the idea of combining academic learning with the important personal development that goes on outside the classroom.

Students who come to Laurier have a wonderful environment in which to learn, to grow, to explore new ideas, to form friendships, to fall in love, to engage in volunteerism and community service, to engage in athletic competition, all in an intimate and highly supportive environment that emphasizes community and belonging.

I believe that the student experience at Laurier is second to none, anywhere. And I hope and trust that you, having lived that experience, feel the same. It is important that we remember this at this particular point in time. Universities everywhere are going through a period of dramatic transformation as we adjust to intense financial pressures, changing demands from students and society, and technological advances that reshape how we deliver education.

Laurier is taking a strategic approach to this change, the best example of which is the recent Integrated Planning and Resource Management (IPRM) exercise, a collegial and thorough process aimed at setting institutional priorities.

Throughout our strategy planning, the Laurier community has recognized the importance of preserving the special learning environment that distinguishes the Laurier experience.

As we move forward through these turbulent times, it is helpful to celebrate alumni like Bill Webb, Alison Wearing and Jeff Melanson in order to remind ourselves about what truly matters.

Dr. Max Blouw
President and Vice-Chancellor
Wilfrid Laurier University