Dear Orange Friends:
Yesterday, November 11, Syracuse University observed Veterans Day. As a university that is committed to being the best school for veterans, Syracuse works hard every day to do right by those who have served and are serving in our Armed Forces. But November 11 is particularly special here.
On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, the main floor of Hendricks Chapel filled with the Syracuse community: students, faculty, staff, alumni, and friends from across the region. We were deeply moved by the performance of the University Singers and by the keynote address of Major General John Batiste, retired, former commander of the 1st Infantry Division in Iraq.
Two of our students gave particularly inspiring talks: Jared Grace, a graduate student in the School of Architecture and an Army ROTC Cadet, and John Higgins II, a senior in the Falk College of Sport and Human Dynamics and President of the Syracuse University Student Veterans Organization. Toward the end of the ceremony, the 198th Army Band played the anthems of each of the services while the veterans present from that service stood—and were recognized and thanked by the entire community. The veterans who stood came from our faculty, our staff, our students, our alumni, and our community, and they were scattered everywhere among the audience in the chapel.
I was struck, after being here 10 months, by how often a man or woman who stood up was someone I know—someone I have met in a machine shop or a classroom or an alumni event or a faculty meeting—but also someone who I had no idea was a veteran. Our veterans are all around us, and are embedded in this great University. On November 11 and every other day, I am grateful for that.
Chancellor Kent Syverud